In article
s.com, thedarkman writes

Have you read my letter and the associated mathematics? No ticket
staff, no revenue protection and therefore no prosecutions for
fraudulent travel, which costs millions in court time and stuff. If
all the money comes from one source - Central Government - you cut
out the costs associated with the other two. All of them.

There is no reason for charging for travel at the time of use -
it is just policy. Especially the policy of the present
control-freak lot, who like to know what everyone is doing - and
most tickets these days are bought in ways which allow the buyer
to be identified - but previous more liberal (small "l"!)
governments probably felt the same way.
Consider TV licences - probably 95% of households have TV, as
opposed to the (roughly) 50% of the population who use trains -
but *all* governments have stubbornly refused to fund the BBC
from general tax revenues. (It would be interesting to know the
cost of the department which chases up non-licence-holders
compared with the amount of revenue "lost".)
--
Bill Borland